


Game Night in the Pegasus Galaxy

by kakotheres



Series: Just Write! Fluff Bingo 2019 [16]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Fluff, Game Night, Gen, Short One Shot, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-07-11 19:49:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19933549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kakotheres/pseuds/kakotheres
Summary: John wants to mix up game night with the team. It's not as easy as one might expect.





	Game Night in the Pegasus Galaxy

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Just Write! Discord server, Fluff Bingo 2019.  
> Prompt: Game Night.

“All right, gang!” John rubbed his hands together, a slightly maniacal grin on his face. “I think it’s past time for another game night!”

Rodney, Teyla, Ronon, and John were sitting around a table in the mostly empty mess hall. They had finished up late from a mission on M3X-449, a small, uninhabited planet that was overrun with a species of tree whose fruit looked like bananas but tasted somewhat similar to non-fat peanut butter. The taste was only slightly off-putting, and the fruits were a good source of Vitamin K. So, the kitchens were enjoying coming up with creative ways to incorporate them into many different dishes. The problem was that the planet’s climate became incredibly hostile for human life by late morning. Thus, any and all fruit-gathering missions needed to be completed before the heat became too unbearable. Team Sheppard had spent the previous night off-world, returning to Atlantis just in time for lunch to be served. John had declared that they would immediately debrief over lunch, despite Rodney’s protests about needing to make sure that ‘the idiot Czech’ hadn’t destroyed Atlantis in his absence.

“Again?” Ronon responded. “I kind of thought the last one was it. You replaced the table Teyla broke last time?”

Teyla elbowed him in the gut, causing him to let out a grunt. “It was extremely rude of Rodney to take all of the threes that I had spent so much time gathering. I was…cross.”

John ignored both of them. “I think we need to branch out more. We’ve played _Go Fish_ the last four times. We need variety!”

Rodney pointed at him with his fork. “At least you agree on the rules for that one. I still think we should try _Uno_ again. You’re only mad because I’m better at it than you are. And I don’t cheat! Just because you’ve never heard of the Progressive Uno doesn’t mean it’s not a real thing. It’s not my fault that Ronon, Teyla, and I each had a Wild Draw Four card and you ended up with half the deck in your hand.”

John ignored him as well. “So, tonight? My quarters at 8? I got Walter to smuggle a few more board games onto the last _Daedalus_ run.” He tipped his chair back on two legs, crossing his hands behind his head. “Should be something good.”

“Of course, John.” Teyla glared at Ronon and Rodney before turning to nod her head at him. “We will all be there. Right, Ronon?”

He grunted in response. Teyla turned her brilliant, slightly menacing smile on Rodney, head tilted slightly.

“Yes, yes,” Rodney replied quickly. “Of course I’ll be there. What else important could I possibly be doing with my time, that I have so much of? I mean, how many things can have gone wrong in Atlantis over the last 12 hours? I’m sure I’ll get it all done in time to for Sheppard’s kumbaya team night.”

John grinned. “Perfect!”

*****

“This one’s new – _Pandemic.”_ Rodney picked up the box, reading aloud the description on the back. “ _Four diseases have broken out in the world and it is up to a team of specialists in various fields_ -ugh, hopefully not the humanities - _to find cures for these diseases before mankind is wiped out. Players must work together playing to their characters' strengths and planning their strategy of eradication before the diseases overwhelm the world with ever-increasing outbreaks_. Who comes up with these things?”

“That sounds way too close to something that could actually happen. I have enough on my plate trying to save mankind in real life, thanks,” John said.

Rodney pointed to a red box sitting next to John. “What about that one?”

John picked it up and shook it a bit. “ _Settlers of Catan?_ ”

“Yes, yes, yes! I love that one! We used to play it in grad school – it wasn’t nearly as well-known as it is now but one of the other guys was really into board games. He probably should’ve spent a lot more time paying attention to his research, maybe then he’d have finished his research before his grant money ran out. He wasn’t a complete idiot and his research -”

“Rodney, we’ve tried that one before, remember?” Teyla cut him off. “It…didn’t exactly go well. I believe there were some…disagreements, about how some people played the game.”

“Yeah, Ronon always ends up hoarding all the sheep because he thinks the cards are cute.”

“Shut up, Sheppard. Like you weren’t after them all for the same reason.”

“Ok, ok. No need to start punching each other, people.” Rodney picked up another box. “What about this one – _Puerto Rico_? It says, ‘ _The aim of the game is to amass victory points by shipping goods to Europe or by constructing buildings_.’ Looks like you take turns buying buildings and…plantations…And then you have to make sure that one of your little brown people is on the factory so you can get goods from it…Ok, you know what? Reading this out loud, it’s starting to sound really…racist…scratch that plan. Who on earth thought this up?”

John grabbed another box from the pile. “Alright, this is a fun one! And the rules are pretty straight forward.”

Teyla took the box from him, turning it over in her hands. “Apples to Apples? Why would one be interested in trading one thing for another thing that is exactly the same? Or is this some sort of…Earth humor?”

“No, no, it’s a game where you put different words together. The goal is to put together a good combination, based on the person who’s judging the round.” Rodney opened the box, pulling out two cards. “See, the goal is to combine and adjective and a noun. If John was the judge, I might pick something like “Fast” and “Airplanes”, you know, because he’s insane.”

“Rodney? Remember how badly Cards Against Humanity went?” John asked. “Maybe we should just stick to games that don’t require a native understanding of the English language.”

“Just because you didn’t want to explain that ‘Child Beauty Pageants’ to Teyla…” Rodney crossed his arms over his chest.

John grimaced. “Yeah, no…and that was nowhere near the worst one. Let’s never do that again.”

“Maybe we should just stick with Go Fish?” Teyla said, arching one brow delicately.

The other three nodded in agreement. Sometimes, it was best not to mess with a good thing.

**Author's Note:**

> This fandom is intimidating to write in, and I'm not sure how well this one worked. A useful experiment, at least.
> 
> All board game descriptions are sourced from product listings.


End file.
